Incumbent wins one-year term to the Juneau School Board

The city certified the election results late Tuesday afternoon, including 12 absentee ballots that were postmarked by Election Day but received only recently, City Clerk Laurie Sica said.

In all, 9,633 ballots were counted, for a turnout of 39.5 percent. The turnout percentage, however, is based on a figure of 24,377 registered voters, which presumably includes some people who don't live in Juneau anymore.

The race for the fifth of five open seats on the seven-person School Board see-sawed between a four-vote lead for Peters on Election Day to a one-vote lead for Schorr after absentee and questioned ballots were counted Friday. In the 12 newly counted ballots, Schorr and Peters each picked up four votes.

Schorr, who was first elected to the School Board in 1991, will win a one-year term.

The top three vote-getters for the board this year - Andi Story, Phyllis Carlson and Julie Morris - won the usual three-year terms. The fourth-highest vote-getter, Rhonda Befort, won a two-year term to complete the term of a member who resigned. And the fifth-highest vote-getter, Schorr, will fill out the last year of another resigned member's term.

"I'm looking forward to continuing to advocate for all the children in Juneau," Schorr said Tuesday after the election was certified. "And I'm also pleased to work with my colleagues on the board to address the complex issues facing the district."

Peters could not be reached immediately for a comment. But he said after being behind by one vote on Friday that he wouldn't apply for a recount.

Defeated candidates or 10 qualified voters have until Thursday to apply for a recount, which would consist of putting the ballots through the ballot-reading Accu-Vote machine again, Sica said Friday. Because the candidates were within 10 votes of each other, the city would bear the cost.